For Josh Hughes-Davies, the best thing about his job in a bar in the coastal city of Brighton is the free meal with every shift.

For his manager, Barrie Chapman, the overtime he now gets is a huge boost once unheard of in the hospitality sector. Their regional manager Jen Eaton looks back in horror at the 14-hour shifts she once worked in casinos in heels with no break.

Like thousands of others in lower-paid sectors of the British economy, all three have benefited from a gradual improvement in employment terms since the global pandemic and Brexit forced companies to work harder to find staff in a tight labour market. The shift follows years of warnings from unions and campaign groups that the balance of power in Britain had swung too far towards employers, leaving many lower-paid staff working unpredictable hours with poor benefits and little protection.

Nick Collins, CEO of Loungers which employs Eaton, Chapman and Hughes-Davies among 8,000 staff in restaurants and bars across Britain, said expectations of employees had risen. “And rightly so. The combination of Brexit and COVID have transformed the market,” he told Reuters.

Conversations with 18 company bosses, HR managers, a union, economists, recruitment groups and workers suggest big employers in hospitality, retail, logistics and security are all offering more flexibility over the hours people work, better financial support for sick leave or private healthcare and other perks. Since the pandemic, US giant Amazon UK has joined retailers Tesco and Marks & Spencer, as well as logistics group XPO and security company G4S, in offering flexible working contracts.

Global recruitment company Indeed told Reuters there has been a steady increase in the percentage of postings offering paid sick leave over the last 18 months, including in hospitality and other lower-paid sectors such as healthcare.

Tesco, Britain’s largest private-sector employer now provides its 310,000 staff with an online private family doctor. And data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show the percentage of people saying they are happy with their hours has been at the highest level over the last year since 2007. While the moves can increase costs and complexity for employers, the former finance director of a FTSE 100 company said businesses had no choice as staff retention had become such a hot topic when workers were hard to find. The executive who sits on other company boards said he expected the use of automation and the hunt for efficiencies to grow as employment costs rise. He asked not to be named because he was not authorised to discuss the matter publicly.

Britain’s labour market started to tighten in 2021 as older people retired early during the global pandemic, Europeans returned home after Britain left the EU and an increasing number were too ill to work.

With just under 1 million job vacancies still open, it has been one factor behind Britain’s stubbornly high inflation rate. It hit 11.1% in October before falling to 6.7% in August, still one of the highest of any major economy. That has forced major employers such as supermarkets, logistics groups and big coffee and food chains to raise wages on multiple occasions in the last 18 months, and even resort to making counteroffers to prevent staff from going elsewhere. Regular pay, excluding bonuses, was 7.8% higher in the three months to July than a year earlier - the joint-fastest growth since comparable records began in 2001.

Loungers said that while its overall wage costs had risen, profits had continued to grow and staff loyalty had increased.

At its “Alcampo Lounge” venue in Brighton, staff can get a free meal per shift, flexible hours, bonuses, and overtime for salaried employees. They also get some weekends off and avoid having to work late and then open early. While the rapidly growing company had always prided itself on offering above-average pay and decent terms, some of those changes have come in since the pandemic. “There’s been a trend in hospitality to work staff hard, to not treat them very well, because there was always another person that would come in,” said head chef Chris Lloyd-Rogers.

Reuters